Contested Claim

[eagles123]

I believe this is under appeal and I was involved as one of the defenders. However even if we get a favourable ruling we move from lower midtable to upper midtable so I can't honestly say I care a great deal just interested from a theoretical point of view

 

[hv=pc=n&s=s5h9742dqj54ck432&w=sakjt8haj8d932ct5&n=s976432hdkt7cqj96&e=sqhkqt653da86ca87&d=e&v=b&b=10&a=1hp2cp2hp3hp3sp4cp4dp4hppp]399|300[/hv]

 

the opponents have some kind of fantunes auction to 4H. South leads his stiff spades and at trick 1 declarer simply tables his hand and claims 13 tricks

 

does it matter if declarer says - a) nothing (simply claims) b) says something about drawing trumps and says he's letting the opening lead ride to his hand

 

Thanks

 

Eagles

[barmar]

If a player I know to be competent made such a claim, I would accept it, unless North could ruff the opening lead. The line is obvious.

 

I made a claim like that on Sunday after bidding to a grand. The hands were something like this:

 

[hv=pc=n&s=sk842hkdaq987c543&n=saqt765ha2d2cakj2&d=s&v=0&b=11&a=1dp1sp2sp4np5hp5np6hp7sppp]266|200[/hv]

 

The opening lead was a club to RHO's Q, giving me the free finesse. I just tabled my hand, and probably said something about "unless trumps are 4-0". I don't remember if dummy's diamonds were headed by AQ or AK. RHO was G.S. Jade Barrett, he mentioned that he also could have been squeezed.

[StevenG]

If a player I know to be competent made such a claim, I would accept it, unless North could ruff the opening lead. The line is obvious.

Is it really?

[barmar]

Never mind, didn't see the blockage. And obviously neither did declarer. :)

[billw55]

Never mind, didn't see the blockage. And obviously neither did declarer. :)

Agree.

 

Although, the first round of trumps reveal the situation. After which, taking immediate pitches on spades is obvious. South ruffs one, and that's the end. Looked at another way, drawing all four trumps first would be irrational.

 

So I rule making 6.

[steve2005]

No way to make 7. Average player should make 6. so 6

[johnu]

Agree.

 

Although, the first round of trumps reveal the situation. After which, taking immediate pitches on spades is obvious. South ruffs one, and that's the end. Looked at another way, drawing all four trumps first would be irrational.

 

So I rule making 6.

 

If declarer miscounted trumps, drawing 3 rounds of trump ending in dummy and running the spades would be 13 tricks (if 3 rounds of trump exhausted opponents trumps).

[pran]

If declarer miscounted trumps, drawing 3 rounds of trump ending in dummy and running the spades would be 13 tricks (if 3 rounds of trump exhausted opponents trumps).

In that case he would (as the cards lie) end up with 9 tricks only.

[WellSpyder]

In that case he would (as the cards lie) end up with 9 tricks only.

Exactly - so are you ruling down 1?

[billw55]

Exactly - so are you ruling down 1?

That would be wrong IMO, and I do not think pran meant that. Even a careless declarer (which this one was) cannot fail to notice north showing out on the first round of trump. It doesn't even matter which trump is played from dummy.

 

I suppose one could contrive to come up with 9 tricks - perhaps ruling that declarer miscounted his own trumps, thinking he had seven. (We know the ten looks like two right? http://www.bridgebase.com/forums/public/style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif) But I think this would be too harsh.

[1eyedjack]

That would be wrong IMO, and I do not think pran meant that. Even a careless declarer (which this one was) cannot fail to notice north showing out on the first round of trump.

What if he discards a card of the same colour?

[billw55]

What if he discards a card of the same colour?

I know, little things like this can be argued.

 

The funny thing is, I take a pretty harsh position on bad claims. But ruling 9 tricks here is too much even for me. (edit: with the laws as they are, that is)

 

Also, another example of why I favor four color cards. One less thing for directors and committees to think about. But hardly anybody seems to want them.

[barmar]

That would be wrong IMO, and I do not think pran meant that. Even a careless declarer (which this one was) cannot fail to notice north showing out on the first round of trump. It doesn't even matter which trump is played from dummy.

I've failed to notice things like that. Granted, it's almost always been when I was playing late at night in robot duplicates while also watching TV, so I'm not exactly playing at my best.

[pran]

In that case he would (as the cards lie) end up with 9 tricks only.

 

Exactly - so are you ruling down 1?

 

That would be wrong IMO, and I do not think pran meant that. Even a careless declarer (which this one was) cannot fail to notice north showing out on the first round of trump. It doesn't even matter which trump is played from dummy.

 

I suppose one could contrive to come up with 9 tricks - perhaps ruling that declarer miscounted his own trumps, thinking he had seven. (We know the ten looks like two right? http://www.bridgebase.com/forums/public/style_emoticons/default/tongue.gif) But I think this would be too harsh.

 

I think (and would rule correspondingly) that a reasonable line of play is: Win the lead with the ♠Q and draw a high trump from East.

 

Now cross to dummy with a second trump and run the spades until South trumps, win the return from South, cross to Dummy with his last trump (pulling the last trump from South) and run the remaining spades.

 

This line only requires Declarer to recognize that South had all four outstanding trumps so that he must be forced to use one of them on a spade while Dummy still has a high trump for a final entry.

 

Not too demanding.

[VixTD]

I think (and would rule correspondingly) that a reasonable line of play is: Win the lead with the ♠Q and draw a high trump from East.

 

Now cross to dummy with a second trump and run the spades until South trumps, win the return from South, cross to Dummy with his last trump (pulling the last trump from South) and run the remaining spades.

 

This line only requires Declarer to recognize that South had all four outstanding trumps so that he must be forced to use one of them on a spade while Dummy still has a high trump for a final entry.

 

Not too demanding.

But your job as director is not to come up with a "reasonable line" for the claimer and award them that result, as I'm sure you know. You should look for normal lines which are consistent with declarer's claim statement (including the inferior and careless) and award the least successful to the claimer, but bearing in mind the requirement of law 70A to adjudicate the result as equitably as possible to both sides.

 

I was the director, and I ruled that he would make twelve tricks. It was not clear to me that declarer had specifically stated that he would draw trumps, and whether he had allowed for the possibility of a 4 - 0 split. He certainly didn't state at the time of the claim what he would do if the trumps were 4 - 0, and I had to decide whether he would really go wrong when he finds out trumps are so divided, or whether he hadn't realised that there were as many as four trumps outstanding.

 

I was aware of all these possibilities, and I was in no doubt that a declarer of this ability and experience would make twelve tricks if he was aware that there were four trumps out. The director I consulted agreed with me. So the only doubt in my mind was whether declarer would be woken up to the actual trump split when one defender showed out on the first round. I decided that he would, although I concede this could be a "doubtful point" that should be resolved against the claimer.

[pran]

But your job as director is not to come up with a "reasonable line" for the claimer and award them that result, as I'm sure you know. You should look for normal lines which are consistent with declarer's claim statement (including the inferior and careless) and award the least successful to the claimer, but bearing in mind the requirement of law 70A to adjudicate the result as equitably as possible to both sides.

 

I was the director, and I ruled that he would make twelve tricks. It was not clear to me that declarer had specifically stated that he would draw trumps, and whether he had allowed for the possibility of a 4 - 0 split. He certainly didn't state at the time of the claim what he would do if the trumps were 4 - 0, and I had to decide whether he would really go wrong when he finds out trumps are so divided, or whether he hadn't realised that there were as many as four trumps outstanding.

 

I was aware of all these possibilities, and I was in no doubt that a declarer of this ability and experience would make twelve tricks if he was aware that there were four trumps out. The director I consulted agreed with me. So the only doubt in my mind was whether declarer would be woken up to the actual trump split when one defender showed out on the first round. I decided that he would, although I concede this could be a "doubtful point" that should be resolved against the claimer.

It is my job as Director to assess which possible lines of play can be considered "normal". In this case I would consider the only "normal" line of play to be winning the lead with the ♠Q and then start pulling trumps with the intention of running the spades once defenders are out of trumps.

 

This is the only line of play that is consistent with the claim, but when the first round of trumps reveals the actual situation I consider it irrational not to maintain control of the board by changing the line of play and force South to spend one of his trumps on a spade while there is still an entry left in Dummy. And Law 70E1 clearly allows the claimer to come up with a line of play not embraced in the original claim statement in a situation like this.

 

So yes, I too would award 12 tricks.

[helene_t]

It is sometimes difficult to draw the line between careless and irrational, but if E is just an average club player (which would be consistent with the sluggish claim), I would be reluctant to giving him 12 tricks. I would not allow for a succesul colour coup, but a trump miscount might be possible, and I think it is also possible that he would just draw trumps without thinking of the issue with entries to dummy before it is too late. Or maybe he would ruff a club in dummy and end up with 10 or 11 tricks.

 

Yes, I know this is careless unless declarer is a beginner, but for an intermediate or even advanced- declarer I think it is just careless, not irrational.

[lamford]

I am astonished at some of the posts on here. In my opinion, this is a routine adjustment to 4H-1. The unsuccessful line of playing three rounds of trumps ending in dummy and then attempting to discard losers on the winning spades would be chosen, I imagine, by quite a few weaker players. It is no worse than careless for someone who misclaims at trick one, an action that has already categorized declarer as careless. It makes 12 tricks when South is 4-4-(3 2) and 13 when South is 5-4-(2 2). Declarer's claim can only be based on his assumption that three rounds of trumps ending in dummy will take care of all the opposing trumps, and that has suggested a miscount already.

 

An excellent OP, by the way.

[gnasher]

I agree with vixTD's ruling. As Lamford says, declarer has already shown us what carelessness he's capable of.

 

I hate that the rules force us to make such inequitable rulings.

[PhilKing]

Interesting. I see that two out of five declarers went down in 4♥ on the singleton spade lead (half of the players that did not make a bum claim).

 

So I think it's fair to say the ruling was questionable.

[billw55]

I hate that the rules force us to make such inequitable rulings.

I agree with this. As it is, when a contract is locked in for a fixed number of tricks, declarers can effectively ask for extra tricks by claiming them, with no fear of loss.

 

Interesting. I see that two out of five declarers went down in 4♥ on the singleton spade lead (half of the players that did not make a bum claim).

 

So I think it's fair to say the ruling was questionable.

I don't even know what to say.

[Zelandakh]

I don't even know what to say.

The thing to say is that directors give average club players far too much credit a lot of the time and that we should not be giving such players the benefit of the doubt in cases where the Laws explicitly say that they should not get it.

[billw55]

The thing to say is that directors give average club players far too much credit a lot of the time and that we should not be giving such players the benefit of the doubt in cases where the Laws explicitly say that they should not get it.

The evidence in this case is certainly on your side. I even thought I was being pretty conservative about applying the standard of "irrational". Apparently I was wrong.

 

 

 

[StevenG]

How is the director to decide whether a person is an average club player?

[billw55]

How is the director to decide whether a person is an average club player?

I think she should use the overall standard of the field. Assigning a ruling based on the skill of an individual contestant seems wrong. Thus, a ruling might be different in a Spingold than in a club game. But not between two contestants in the same event.